Posted on 04/04/2009 3:53:55 PM PDT by T.L.Sink
By way of "Net Neutrality," the federal government is preparing to do to the Internet what it has done to the auto industry, public schools, the home mortgage industry, the postal service and the financial industry bailout. The Obama administration now seeks to regulate the Internet as well. "Net Neutrality" refers to the dangerous movement to have government dictate Internet providers' business models, and the manner in which they can transmit data. Obama's infamous "stimulus" package includes a $7.2 billion grant to expand broadband services that require carriers accepting government money to adhere to FCC Net Neutrality guidelines that empower the FCC and National Telecommunications and Information Administration (NTIA) to devise even more rules for any Internet provider that accepts funds.
(Excerpt) Read more at cfif.org ...
How long does FR got until it’s officially non-existent?
It’s not only closer than it appeared, it’s here! And I thought such mirrors were designed to prevent accidents - but now we’re in a big one!
Well..., that’s a mistake that I see a lot of people making. Even a political foe can produce something of benefit... LOL...
Keep in mind, that with the type of “thinking” that you’ve just mentioned (to me in your post) — if Obama offered a huge tax cut to everyone, and thus reduced everyone’s tax burden dramatically — you would oppose it... LOL..
Therefore, you have to look at “each item” individually and evaluate things for what they are.
But then again, he wouldn’t offer that tax cut, now would he? Oh contrare, he’s bumping taxes UP UP UP
Just an example to show you that you have to analyze each thing individually...
No, Net “Neutrality” forcibly prevents ISPs from offering upgraded services, like dedicated bandwidth channels for streaming hi-def video.
As streaming HD video becomes widespread, this gets kind of important if you ever want video on par with TV. The lefties that support it think that if they force companies not to offer higher tiers of service, then they’ll have no choice but to simply offer everyone connections with super high dedicated speeds and they’ll reap the benefits.
It’s the equivalent of banning Overnight, Second Day, and First Class mail so long as there’s cheapo third class junk mail. FedEx doesn’t just say “ok everybody’s mail is now overnight!” because that isn’t feasible.
All it will do is cripple web development as everyone is forced down to the lowest common denominator. (Then add all the cutesy games the regulators will play with those they favor vs. those they don’t.)
Businesses pay more for the same peak speed rating because they want guaranteed bandwidth all the time. My speed is blazing at 3am but I accept that if I hop on at peak times I might get lag.
It’s a minor inconvenience until you decide to watch movies. Why should my internet choices be forced to turn my movie into a stuttering, buffering mess in order to pass email with the same priority? If I want to pay extra for a channel dedicated to real-time video without interruptions, I should be able to.
This isn't an accident; it was planned.
You were saying — The lefties that support it think that if they force companies not to offer higher tiers of service, then they’ll have no choice but to simply offer everyone connections with super high dedicated speeds and they’ll reap the benefits.
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Net Neutrality does nothing to prevent someone from charging more for higher bandwidth. That’s been done for quite a while and I actually pay for higher bandwidth. I’ve got several choices, and although I could pick something less than a megabit down, I picked 16 megabits down, and have to pay more for it. That’s never been the issue with Net Neutrality.
I’ve noticed that the people who argue against Net Neutrality seem to think that it applies here, but that’s never been mentioned and has never been the argument and one will always pay more for the increased and “higher speeds” (i.e., more bandwidth). Nothing will ever prevent that from being done.
You’ve got the wrong argument there...
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And then you were saying — Businesses pay more for the same peak speed rating because they want guaranteed bandwidth all the time. My speed is blazing at 3am but I accept that if I hop on at peak times I might get lag.
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Again, that’s a false argument. If I wanted *guaranteed* bandwidth, and the consumer version of what I have is not really *guaranteed* — then I would expect to pay more. And..., I *will* pay more — which will have absolutely nothing to do with Net Neutrality. I would be paying for a different kind of service, altogether, and it would cost me dramatically more. I know, because I’ve checked on it. But, in practice, I’ve got such high bandwidth right now, for what I pay, it makes no sense for me to go to the other type of service.
There’s nothing in the Net Neutrality concept to prevent these other types of services where businesses would get *guarantees* for bandwidth, of which the “consumer versions” do not get. It’s another service, altogether. That can still be sold with no limitations from Net Neutrality.
It’s another bogus argument that you’re presenting here...
Thanks for those references but, in my opinion, many good- sounding and plausible reasons can be made for increasing government regulation and control. But it’s not only a matter of (mis)interprestation but the law of unintended consequences. The government is very adept at choosing titles and descriptions of legislation that, once examined, prove to be the very opposite of what they purport to be. For example, the “Fairness Doctrine.” Great title! Who could possibly be opposed to “fairness?” We need only remember, for example, how the Supreme Court has distorted the “interstate commerce” clause of the Constitution as an excuse to regulate nearly everything in the nation! - even though this is clearly a violation of original intent. In other words, the words and the underlying reality and intentions can be two entirely different things. I think as a general rule that government regulation - barring a near-universal agreement that it’s necessary to rectify some specific evil - should be avoided. We’ve seen what has resulted otherwise in our insanely litigious society.
Well, I’m not going by “titles” of legislation... LOL...
I’m actually going by the concepts that are involved. And for that, even though I do use the “title” of “Net Neutrality” — it’s the concept that I’m going for, in that the Internet should be “neutral” in terms of the traffic that it allows and nothing should impede it, by singling out certain services and/or blocking them or slowing them down, which is not done now.
And as I have already mentioned in another post, this has nothing to do with charging more for increased bandwidth, which has always been brought up as the “red herring” of the issue (has never been the issue). And also it has nothing to do with “guaranteed service” that businesses do pay more for, that most all consumer never get and/or never pay for (it would be too expensive for consumers).
I do believe the “devil is in the details” — and it’s the *details* of Net Neutrality that I’m talking about...
Bump for later read.
I think so, too. They’ll interpret it and use it to serve their own partisan purposes - and we all know what they are!
True - a premeditated crime!
Yes, leave the Internet alone. But that’s exactly what “Net Neutrality” won’t do when Obama and his shyster lawyers get to work on it.
Thanks for that clarification of your views. If I understand you rightly, we’re not very far apart on the issue.
The video is called Death of the Internet and talks about the censorship and restructuring coming.
It’s not “higher” bandwidth. It’s the fixed channels net “neutrality” forces out of existence.
Right now I have my X peak bandwidth. During times of heavy usage, it decreases, and I personally find that acceptable. I see a $40/month connection that is sometimes laggy as a better deal than a $1500/month fixed pipe T1. I watch some TV online and accept the lower resolution, buffering, and skips.
Down the road, the internet will be much more integrated with your TV. At that point I won’t be watching a short video on my computer, I’ll want the resolution, quality, instantaneousness, and 99.99% reliability of an actual TV (it’ll probably be through my TV as well).
The only way you can do this is to create a pipe or lane for specific data—the kind that has to get there right this second or else the next frame in the high-def movie you’re watching won’t be there and the movie will stop/stutter. That means it takes priority over stuff like web page requests, emails, and other data whose arrival isn’t critical to the tenth of a second.
Net “neutrality” absolutely bans that under the guise of class-warfare rhetoric. Because if I’m able to buy an internet package where a chunk of speed is dedicated to streaming hi-def movies, my poor email will have to live like a third-class citizen and therefore I need to be protected from myself and barred from buying that service.
Of course, hi-def video streaming is just the first and biggest impact. As the internet develops (or is kept from developing once gov’t gets its hands on it), there are countless other services that we haven’t even thought of that this would bar. If someone wants to offer videoconferencing using the web instead of pricy phone line setups, net “neutrality” will say they’re discriminating by not offering “access” to the internet, when it’s not supposed to be internet access to begin with.
Ditto if you want to make, say, a cheap shopping appliance that lets you connect to web retailers but can’t handle someone trying to pull massive torrent files through it. These are just simple ideas I can think up, but the point is all the much better future ideas will be DOA since a bumbling government body will be forcing the lowest common denominator on everyone. Instead of the option of a passing lane, everyone will be stuck in the same gridlock.
You said — Down the road, the internet will be much more integrated with your TV. At that point I won’t be watching a short video on my computer, I’ll want the resolution, quality, instantaneousness, and 99.99% reliability of an actual TV (it’ll probably be through my TV as well).
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Yeah..., it’s sorta like having a highway/freeway with three lanes going each way (six total). So, you decide that trucks are a “service” that are needed for our basic good in delivering goods to everyone, so you allocate two of those lanes to the trucks, and they’ll pay for the “service”, too — and leave one lane of traffic for the rest of the citizens (i.e., all the automobile that people drive).
Instead of building bigger highways to accommodate the traffic of trucks and automobiles, you just decide to squeeze out the automobiles since trucks will pay a lot of money for the two lanes that they’ve got... LOL...
Sorry, my solution would be to keep it for trucks and automobiles and build bigger highways to accommodate all the traffic and not squeeze everyone else out, for the benefit of the “paying” trucks.... :-)
I’ll keep the highways for “everyone” allowing them all to use the roads indiscriminately, and build the highways to “meet the traffic” — and likewise, keep the Internet “net neutral” and allow all the services to occupy it and build out the capacity to “meet it”....
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